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title: Da Factory Training Facility
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A dull thud shakes the padded floor as Ronny Lindsay drops a barbell after demonstrating squat thrusters to his student. All around him trainers bellow motivation, and the air is damp with the sweat of men and women of all ages powering through the workout of the day. This scenario plays out daily for Bruno and his team of trainers, each of whom holds at least a CrossFit Level 1 trainer certification and listens to a soundtrack of workout grunts on a loop before bed.
The trainers introduce exercisers to CrossFit gradually. They start by teaching On Ramp fundamentals classes and then roll out the workout of the day, which typically includes a nonstop sequence of exercises such as sprints, lunges, and pull-ups. Aside from the daily workout, the trainers oversee a specialized CrossFit Football program, which was created with guidance from an actual professional football veteran.

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title: CrossFit 4U
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CrossFit 4U declares itself a CrossFit boutique, in which students of all fitness levels can explore functional movements with personalized attention in an upscale training space. Within the brightly lit studio flecked by vibrant fitness equipment, the passionate instructors push clients through exercises that draw from actions relevant to real life.
The strenuous workouts prime bodies for everyday activities such as climbing stairs, yard work, and lifting heavy objects, such as newborn rhinos. Patrons hoist brightly colored weights and toss medicine balls, and they stimulate major muscle groups with pushups and squats. Each class introduces a new Workout of the Day, which burns calories and swells strength levels at an intense but scalable pace. To supplement CrossFit choreography, staff members also dispense nutrition tips for more wholesome eating plans to enhance workout results.

The inspiring trainers at each MetaBody location lead troops of workouteers in results-oriented workouts several times weekly. Sweat sessions utilize a variety of exercises and disciplines to produce full-body results in a supportive environment, ideal for beginners and hard-core core-hardeners alike. During any class, motivational instructors will use the instinctual distrust of routine to their advantage. Begin a day of litigating with a refreshing early-morning boot-camp session, or wind down by burning evidence and pounds with a late-evening yoga class. Muscles are kept guessing with new and challenging moves during each session, so participants never fall into a boring, ineffective routine, such as regular teeth brushing. In addition to the fitness classes, students receive a success guide to help prepare for imminent pound loss, a nutrition guide, and a $100 gift certificate for individual coaching. Because the pass sets a 5 or 10-class cap at any given location, roving fitness mavens can further shake up their workout regimens by vetting a series of classes or instructors that work best for them.

With its shades open, Revo Entertainment Center looks like a typical indoor field. With its shades drawn, though, its true colors show. Its true glow-in-the-dark colors, to be exact.
The fun center's 3D murals give off an ethereal light that alludes to the spot's specialty: glow-in-the-dark games, that come to life with the help of 3D glasses. During Glow Soccer, youngsters play a game similar to traditional soccer, except in the dark, the field lit by each team's glow shirts and the ball itself. LazerBall, on the other hand, fuses paintball and laser tag into a single, cosmically-themed sport in which players shoot soft pellets and laser light at each other in a battle over the fictional Planet Revo. Though similar to paintball pellets, the LazerBalls do not explode upon impact and won't stain clothes or ruin any priceless artworks used as shields. For littler laser warriors, the center also offers an age-appropriate version of the game known as Lazerball Soft, which uses extra soft spongy balls that are gentle on tiny torsos and limbs.

They call it the box instead of a gym or health club because there are no mirrors, no cafés, no hoopla. Once in the box, the only thing to focus on is the workout. That consists of a series of intense exercises that employ everyday movements such as pushing, pulling, and lifting. By using functional motions, clients boost their mobility, speed, and power, enhancing their daily, sports, recreational, and work activities. PowerBox Athletic Center's system sculpts muscles throughout the body, and to ensure optimal health and wellbeing, its onsite nutrition specialist advises individuals in proper dieting.

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title: A Chat with CrossFit Whirlwind
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html_text: What services does your business offer and what makes your business stand out from the competition?
At CrossFit Whirlwind you are more than just a member, you're family! Each new member is screened using the Functional Movement Screen (FMS) in order to determine a baseline and starting point for their fitness journey. From there our staff can tailor each workout to the individual's needs.
Exercise is challenging. How do you keep clients motivated and engaged?
Our clients stay motivated in their workout routines through observable and measurable feedback and setting SMART goals. The old saying goes "What gets measured, gets managed"What was the inspiration to start or run this business?
The inspiration behind Whirlwind is and always will be its clients. What do you love most about your job?
Being able to help our clients make positive lifestyle changes that they once thought impossible and helping everyone who comes through the door see that it is not about the destination, but about the journey is one of the things I love most about my job.

Groupon Guide

During our photo shoot with Brendan Ziegler, a CrossFit trainer at Atlas Performance, we asked him to do “whatever looks the coolest.” He delivered with the move above: a muscle-up. The picture shows how it started, with Brendan dead-arm hanging from from the rings, swinging his legs. Suddenly, mid-swing, he hoisted himself up until he was vertical, arms at his sides.
If that sounds impossible, don’t worry—it took him months to master.
For CrossFit newbies, though, it’s not just techniques like these that are intimidating. The very language of CrossFit can sound strange if you’ve never heard been to a box before. When he was done muscle-up-ing, we asked Brendan to break down some CrossFit terms, starting with “CrossFit” itself.
General Terms
CrossFit (noun)
CrossFit is a core strength and conditioning program. Core as in core curriculum—“it’s basic, foundational movements that everyone needs to do”—and core as in the trunk of your body. Brendan said that strength radiates from the core to the limbs, so when CrossFit works your core, it’s also building arm strength, leg strength, and everything-else strength.
The result is what many CrossFit coaches call “functional fitness.” That is, fitness that allows you to confidently perform real-life tasks, from running to lifting a heavy box.
Box (noun)
A CrossFit gym. At Atlas Performance, climbing ropes and rings hang from the ceiling, and the equipment is mostly dumbbells, barbells, and stacks of boxes. It’s all very pared down and lacks the machinery you might be used to seeing in a typical gym.
Power (noun)
CrossFit involves power in the physics-class sense of the word. The workouts improve students’ ability to move a heavy load over a long distance, quickly. This corresponds with the equation for power: force times distance over time.
This makes CrossFit a “quantifiable training methodology,” Brendan said. In other words, you can track your progress in numbers: the heaviest weight you can handle, how many reps you can do, and how fast you can go.
Scalable (adjective)
This means that every CrossFit movement can be scaled to the individual student’s strength and abilities. “I can make it lighter, [have] less range of motion, [or] change the movement entirely,” Brendan said. “There’s no prerequisite to do CrossFit.”
For example, he might scale a pull-up by working in resistance bands or by changing the action altogether. A less experienced student could do a dead-arm hang, which brings you closer to achieving a pull-up by working your forearms and hands.
WOD (noun)
WOD stands for workout of the day. When CrossFit started, it was just a different WOD video posted daily on CrossFit.com. Now, CrossFitters run through these WODs in gyms—although to fill out hourlong classes, trainers often embellish the WOD.
These workouts typically consist of two or three repeated moves. The most fun part? They often have human names, like Murph or …
Fran (noun)
This universally dreaded WOD has two elements: pull-ups and thrusters, the latter of which Brendan is demonstrating above. A thruster is a full squat, with your barbell on your shoulders. To perform the move, you squat so that your hip crease is below your knees, then stand up and lift the bar overhead.
The Fran consists of 21 thrusters and 21 pull-ups, then 15 thrusters and 15 pullups, then 9 and 9. That’s 45 of each, total. For the best CrossFitters in the world, Brendan said that this takes a mere 90 seconds.
Bonus Acronyms
AMRAP (phrase)
As many rounds as possible. This term is usually used for circuit workouts.
EMOM (phrase)
Every minute on the minute. For example, a WOD might involve five squats with 80% of your maximum squat weight, EMOM.
Photos by Andrew Nawrocki, Groupon
Take a look at other less traditional ways to get fit:
Five Things You Might Not Know About Trampolining (But Should)
Five Apps That Make Exercise Feel Like a Video Game